


You know what sucks? Going through puberty. Twice.

by septimsempra



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon LGBTQ Character, Canon-Typical Behavior, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, LGBTQ Characters, My Chemical Romance References, Nonbinary Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-12-26 04:28:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18275783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/septimsempra/pseuds/septimsempra
Summary: What happens after the blue light fades from the theatre and the world turns to dust? Well, not after really. It's not a linear time-scale-- Either way, once the blue light fades the Umbrella Academy finds themselves situated around a familiar dining room table in the middle of an unforgettable encounter involving Five and their Father. Guess who got the hang of acorn-ing? Mostly? Siblings 1-6 remember their world ending, but 7 either doesn't remember or has nothing to remember. This is how they save the world: by taking their second chance. But no good deed is left unpunished.





	1. The World is Ugly

Where we last left our heroes. . .  
Luther could feel Vanya’s frame getting smaller along with his own with every pulse of electric current.  
Diego felt the shaking of the theatre around them, illuminated by the blinding blue-white light.  
Allison managed to watch the world crumbling around them through wide eyes, feeling her neck heal with a strong electric pulse from Five.  
Klaus, painfully sober for the first time in longer than he could remember felt the world dying under his feet, and far-away screaming reaching only someone who could hear the dead.  
Five was aching with concentration, knowing that wherever he was taking them that he’d have a headache for days.  
Ben felt more solid than ever. He could smell gunpowder in the air, and his hand firmed up on his brother’s shoulder.  
Vanya was experiencing the world through a haze. All she could truly make out was a ringing in her head and a white-blue fog.

* * *

 

Suddenly everything was still, and the roaring in their ears ceased. Five was standing at his father’s side while the rest of their family was seated in their spots around their kitchen table. Luther’s eyes were glued to his human hands and arms. Diego was staring at their mom. Allison’s hand was on her throat. Klaus had a half rolled cigarette in his hand that he dropped scattering the tobacco all over the floor as he looked at Ben with wide eyes. Ben paused a moment before stuffing the food in front of him into his face with little thought.  
If Reginald noticed their strange behavior, he didn’t comment on it instead focused on Five. “A spatial jump is trivial when compared with the unknowns of time travel.” The wave of deja vu that affected the room was palpable, at least to the siblings. “One is like sliding along the ice, the other is akin to descending blindly into the depths of the freezing water and reappearing as an acorn."  
At the end of the table, Vanya shook her head at him, eyes wide and pleading. What came next cut the thick tension in the room. Five walked briskly back to his side of the table to sat down and pressed his fingers to his temples, and his elbows into the table.  
Needing to have the last word no matter what, Reginald finally turned to look at Five through his monocle and ordered, “I forbid you to talk of this again.”  
Ben, plate finished, looked up excitedly and asked, “Could I have seconds?”  
“No talking at the table,” Reginald snapped. Klaus and Diego leaned tensed, ready to defend Ben, but nothing happened beyond that. After the table finished their lunches, they were excused to begin their various afternoon studies.  
Despite the fact that they were all nearly 30 internally, the ingrained routine was followed easily. They went to their various rooms.  
Luther sat at his desk before taking off his shirt and simply looking at his arms. The tattoo was still visible on his skin. Skin that wasn't covered in coarse hair or hiding bulging muscles.  
Diego automatically reached for a book that hadn't even been published yet only to grasp a different book about martial weapons.  
Allison sat on her bed with a hand at her neck, unmoving. She could only think of one person. Her eyes watered.  
Klaus laid on his floor with his fists against his eyes. There were so many conflicting emotions whirling across his half-covered face. Awe. The only thing he was addicted to was cigarettes. Sorrow. He hadn't met Dave in this timeline. Hope. He hadn't met him yet.  
By the time that Five got to his room, his nose was bleeding. Once there, he simply flipped the light switch off and stuffed some tissues in his nose. He got situated on his bed, propped up by pillows, and promptly fell asleep, exhausted.  
Ben skid into his room and threw himself into his bed. The sensations against his skin felt fantastic. He could almost ignore the writhing from within.  
Vanya went to her room and sat on her bed. She was relieved that Five hadn’t upset their father more. She got out her violin and began to practice.

* * *

 

After a few minutes of relishing being alive, Klaus stood up from the floor, expecting to groan with pain for laying on the ground like a moron, but his 13-year-old body wasn’t giving him the pain signals that he was expecting. He took a good look at his room: the unmarked walls in particular. Putting aside a mental note to fix that later, Klaus took a step out of his room and began walking down the hallway toward Luther and Allison’s rooms. If there was one thing in this world that Klaus knew about it was grief, even if he spent a bunch of his time drowning out his own, or running from it.  
Vanya’s door was open, and he could hear the easy sounds of violin playing from her room. It sounded basic and like she had only just begun to learn how to play. Did Vanya… not remember? With a horrible pause, he looked into her room to watch her look at music on a stand and shakily play. Klaus shook his head to deal with this another time.  
He knocked once on Allison’s door which was already open. She wiped her eyes and looked up at him. “Klaus,” she greeted, voice muted.  
“Allison,” he responded, smiling. “I know we aren’t the closest--but I know. I just don’t know what you need. A shoulder to cry on, a distraction, gentle words, the hard truth… A wombo-combo mixture of them? Something else entirely?” Noticing that he was rambling on and on he slowed his gesturing hands and tucked them into his pockets neatly. “Whatever it is, I’m your apparently pubescent and gangly teenaged brother. And I’m here for you.”  
She laughed through her silent tears and stood to pull her brother into a hug. “A distraction,” she suggested. Grateful for Klaus’ insight.  
“I’ve just the idea,” he smiled.


	2. Look Alive, Sunshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Klaus delivers a distraction as promised.

Vanya looked over her sheet music to see two of her siblings at her door. Allison’s eyes were puffy, and it looked like she’d been crying. Klaus looked distracted but happy enough. “Um, hey,” she greeted. 

“Hey, Vanya. We heard you playing. Could we sit and listen while we do our assigned readings?” Klaus asked with a big smile on his face. 

“I uh, I thought you told me that you thought classical music was lame,” she murmured, embarrassed. 

Klaus suddenly looked irritated, but before Vanya could worry that it was directed at her, he agrees, “Well yeah that sounds like some dumb shit I would say. And it’s not really up my alley of usual music I listen to, but the violin can be really cool and versatile. Not that I expect you to play rock music or anything. But can you imagine if you did? Or even if you just learned how to play that Devil Goes Down to Georgia song.” Klaus’ eyes lit up like he hadn’t even thought of that before now. He did an exaggerated gasp and looked at Allison with wide eyes. “We need to get her a golden fiddle.”

Allison looked at the ceiling with a long-suffering smile on her face. “I think what Klaus means is that he’s sorry that he said classical music was lame.” Klaus nodded enthusiastically. 

“Yes, I am sorry that I called classical music lame. And for other things that I can’t think of right now,” Klaus agreed.

“Could we listen?” Allison asks, gesturing to Vanya’s chair. 

Vanya smiled at her siblings and nodded. Allison claimed her chair and opened up her book settling into the chair. Klaus simply lay on his stomach next to the chair. He had an entirely different book and was doodling in the margins of it. Turning back towards her music stand, she shuffled the papers around and moved a piece that she knew better than the one she had been practicing. She wanted to show off a little. With a nervous smile, she flipped on her metronome and it began tapping a quick beat. She readied herself and counted softly before starting on  _ Morning Mood _ . 

As she played she allowed the gentle scratchings of Klaus’ pencil and the occasional page turning from Allison calm her rather than worry her. She smiled as she played the easy and familiar notes. She reached down and flipped her music notes in search of another easy song to play for her siblings. She settled on one that the two would probably know. The soft melody of  _ Amazing Grace _ started playing, and she could hear the scratchings of Klaus pick up, and Allison’s page-turning slow. She smiled and closed her eyes, not needing to read the music to play a song she’s played a hundred times before. 

Their afternoon continued on, and before they knew it the time for their afternoon physical training came around. Klaus sprung up from the ground.

“Thank you for the show Vanya,” he thanked as he grinned from ear to ear before bouncing off down the hallway, forgetting entirely about his belongings in Vanya’s room. Allison collected her book after carefully marking her page. 

“I’ll see you later Vanya,” Allison assured, smiling gently. She exited the room and walked the opposite direction as Klaus. Vanya shut her door to change in private. Noticing that her brother had left his book, she went to pick it up. She couldn’t help but examine the drawings that he’d done. There were various aliens on half the page, and close studies of eyes and some scrawled note-taking, but what Vanya’s attention focused on was that Klaus had doodled a small Vanya in the margins of his textbook. She was playing the violin, and the words scrawled next to the drawing were:  _ That Saved A Wretch Like Me. _


End file.
